Spring Stitchin' in the Scrub..........

Early in September I co-hosted Spring Stitchin' in the Scrub retreat with Deb from The Crafters Cottage......thanks Deb for co-hosting.....

There was 21 of us altogether...........great size group...........

Many regulars and some newbies............

As usual it worked perfectly............

Remember the daisies from the last post...........Brenda worked her magic with them and once again we had beautiful flowers on the tables............

We had so many we decorated the food area also...............

The room set up..........

massive thanks to everyone who helped..........

With Dad sick (not dying at this point) I was worried about him and popped away to visit several times........And my back was bad.........Standing was ok once I was up but how I got thru the first week when I hurt my back I am not sure..........I needed distractions really as not much provided any comfort except standing.....so pottering around was working for me........

I did quite a bit of cooking on the Wednesday after I hurt it..........Mr Chooky had to keep coming to do things like grab something out of the cupboard or put things in and out of the oven..........

Deb and I catered all the food..............

Most importantly we had to celebrate Brenda's birthday................

OMG I so want to be like Brenda when I am 90.........she is amazing..........

I didn't take many photos this retreat.........to many other distractions........

once again lots of happy faces and new friends to make.........

Machines and sewing stuff everywhere.............

Deb had set up a little shop in the corner which was great.............I brought a few bits........I didn't get a photo this time...........

my new table clothes..........an excuse for Janice to come and deliver the extra ones she brought me............She wasn't coming and then made a rash decision to join us...........

Unfortunately the cabins were not available so most of the girls stayed at Reggies Pub.........we had dinner there Friday night and I don't even have one photo.............woops...........

A couple of us were going to stay in one of the pavillions with Di and Miranda in their van but we got one of the cabins at the last minute..........they have painted and redone the floors and foundations of all the cabins so that is great...........

One of the quilts I made.............I did do a little sewing........

Some of the girls had there finished orange peel cushion covers that we made in the workshop I attended earlier in the year..........that's when this retreat was hatched...........nice to see theirs finished.........mine is still a work in progress........

Kaz one of the new girls was like a sewing machine........so inspiring.......she was constantly finishing tops..........some needed piecing.........others just borders etc....every time I looked over she was working on something else.........she held this one up at show and tell but it still needed the other borders on...........

Anyway that's it for the retreat..........

Catch you later.........

Chookyblue........

 

where were we at...........

Well I've done a few posts of things but I realised I missed August and Sept completely..........

So here's a quick summary of the last few months.........

August.......

Got some new chooks and they are doing great.........laying heaps of eggs..........

No idea now what I cooked scones for but hey they were good.............

Bridget had lambs.............Milly and Billy.............They have grown up and about to leave home...........

Loving seeing livestock drinking off mum............

We'd had some rain and the paper daisies were insane..............these yellow ones were the best I have ever seen..............

I picked lots..........

The countryside was a picture of green and flowers..............

I dried lots of bunches for the retreat I co hosted in September..........

more on that later...........

&&&&&&

September was full on...........but I did survive..........

on top of everything else I hurt my back and its sure taken it's toll........

A very big wakeup call with everything piled on death and illness makes you reevaluate many things..........

This beautiful grevillea was in the hospital garden when I was with Dad...........

Sadly he passed away.............

We had a crazy trip to Darwin for my son's wedding............what an emotional roller coaster..............

random photos.............

I should have said no to this drive that Fairy Girl wanted me to take her on as I was in agony with my back in the car but I the enjoyed the early morning light and the calm was nice...........

Here's a photo of Fairy Girl and I at the wedding............

There is so much water around Darwin............

That brings us to an end for September..........

&&&

Onto October..........

Lots of cousins to see at Dad's funeral...........

then I really just shut down for a lot of it as I needed too..........

We sold most of these steers............they did well.............

Fairy Girl went for a photo shoot at the pink daisy paddock and I got to go with her..........

There was a few zooms.............more on the Cancer Fundraiser in another post.............

I had been doing some gardening and heard this garden was open so I took myself off for a visit..............

It was beautiful..........

I was so inspired..........and been enjoying plenty of time in my own garden............

Boy Wonder and family were home for a few days which was such a surprise and I thought only Boy Wonder was coming..........they helped with some gardening also.........

Mr Chooky was rarely around for weeks while he helped friends with harvest.............

&&&

Then November came around......... 

I ran away from home with my Quilting buddy Miss Jules to a retreat in Qld for a few days..........

I went back to work just part time last week........

I've been off since early September when Dad got sick...........

I took a longer break...........my poor body was in need to repair and some extra care.........

Addy and the lamb are doing well............The dodgy lamb died - it just wasn't doing well or drinking enough either...........and another one accidently got run over.......not by me thankfully.........but someone did get told off............

Its been a firey month.........mostly machinery starting fires while harvesting..............

In our area we have been pretty busy..............

This was my view to one of the fires.........Mr Chooky has been picked up by one of the neighbours to get onto our brigade truck.............I was coming along with a ute and tanker trailer..........a young bloke I found at the fire jumped on my hose............I think we made a good team..........

I know this posted started off nice and green with heaps of flowers but it has hardly rained since.............so everything has been tinder dry.............this one took off in the wind from the crop stubble and into grasses.............

We had some big trees that caused issues during the night and sparks were blowing long distances into dry grass over the road.............It was very windy that night..............

Sunrise the next day and lots of trees burning on the edge of the fire...............

We managed to hold it and all was good but you can see the dust and ash that was being picked up by the strong winds in this photo............grit kept being blown into our eyes...............

A pretty sunset...............

the clouds to the east had the sun on them as it was setting............so pretty...........

there was 3 layers of clouds............one going east, one west and another south..........they were hiking it too...........

We have just started feeding sheep this week and it is raining today so I hope we get more..........

Agapanthus have started to open which I love............

Finally I put some christmas lights up...........

the only decorating I will be doing here............

"The lamb" was helping as the poddies are in the extended front garden yard.......

There have been some cracking storms around...........

we got 20mm overnight and I stayed home from work as they have forecast 40-80mm today...........and there was lots more rain between home and town............

we'll see what happens............last time they said forecast 25mm and we got 2mm............

I am hoping to do some zoom time over the weekend since I don't need to water the garden..........

 fingers crossed it will be way too wet to garden...........

Have a great weekend..........

Chookyblue........

 

National Ag Day...........

National Ag Day.............a day to celebrate and learn about Agriculture............

I feel its a day to spread awareness of Agriculture also............

Wheat (above) a staple food around the world

The harvest isn't ours but Mr Chooky was helping out friends...........

Tractor and chaser bin follow aka chase the headers around the paddocks to get the grain from them that they have harvested..............

Header emptying into a chaser bin...........often they are both still moving............

Chaser bins take it back to silos, trucks or temp storage spots...............

GPS systems make all these rows perfectly straight............

you support your neighbours in times of need................

you get to enjoy nature daily.................

everyday ends with beauty..............

we mostly grow sheep (meat and wool) and cows..............

the joy of seeing a full dam means we have had good rain to fill it..............securing our water for our animals and my garden............

One of my neighbours grew this amazing block of pink daisies.............let me know if your in Australia and you want some............she dried heaps and now she is selling them..........

A smokey sunset................

finally I picked a bunch of these gorgeous flowers fresh from the paddocks...................

they just grow naturally...............

that's is for now..........

if you have any questions please ask.............

Catch you later...........

Chookyblue........